Page 51 of GlitchBorn Heart

ANOMALY DETECTED

The grid I’m standing on convulses, folding inward. My scream comes out as static tearing from my throat as I fall through the floor of neon lines. I hit the ground, if it is ground, hard. My knees scrape across the black surface. My breath is ragged, though no fresh air fills my lungs. A white noise grows louder, hissing from everywhere, threatening to drown me.

I come to an abrupt halt, my legs underneath me, the choking sensation ceasing as I rest on my hands. The world stitches itself together as if nothing happened. A vast chamber, endless walls of light etched with flowing code scroll in front of me, beckoning me to enter. I stumble upright, staring at the cathedral of circuitry stretching in every direction.

The voice booms again, closer this time.

ANOMALY SEQUESTERED

WOULD YOU LIKE TO BEGIN DELETION DR. RYUDON?

My chest tightens. I spin, searching, but there’s no one. Deletion? Dr. Ryudon? “Kael?” I call out for him desperately. “Kael?! Can you hear me?”

A shadow appears between the columns of code, forming the suggestion of a man. Broad-shouldered, tall, and still. The outline flickers in and out like the system is trying to magnify him, reveal him to me.

The sound of his voice coils through me; he’s saying something about anomalies and viruses. My stomach flips with recognition.

Yep, that’s Kael.

Maybe I’m just unconscious? Coma? But it’s no use. I can’t respond. “No...” My whisper trembles. “No, it can’t be him.”

But it is. I know this...

The sound of static swells, swallowing the chamber, and for a second I feel his presence pressing against mine, almost close enough to touch. I reach out to nothing, just empty space that flickers as I draw my hand back. That’s strange. It’s as if the air is solid, and each time I reach out, I’m breaking through, damaging a wall.

The shadows breathe. That’s the only way I can describe it. The way the chamber warps around me feels suffocating, the air heavy with eyes unseen but watching. My body trembles as my mind screams to wake, to break free, to rip this blackness from my skull, and claw my way back to reality.

But reality is gone.

I hear him again speaking to the voice, everywhere and nowhere. I listen carefully and surmise he’s letting it track an anomaly...which is probably me. He’s giving it permission for deletion, as if I’m some virus injected into his perfectly architected city system.

A shudder runs down my spine, a presence, something watching me again, but I can’t quite grasp where it is in this nothingness. I startle when the voice echoes around me, now focused solely on me.

YOU DON’T BELONG HERE

That voice. It’s maddening because it’s all too familiar. It’s the voice on my DataLINK, my LINKpad, the voice of everyday life. LINK, the VikkCorp AI. It’s the sound coming from the panels at work, the elevators, the appliances. But that threat? It almost sounded human.

“Then let me out!” My voice crackles like fire across the grid. “Please, you’re right. I don’t belong here! Help me get out!”

Silence.

The clinical AI voice suddenly booms back, full of glitch-like distortions.

ANOMALY DETECTED

PROTOCOL: DELETION

REQUESTING ACCESS DR. RYUDON

I can hear Kael actively interacting with his system to scrub out any type of anomaly or virus. Is that me? I don’t understand.

I begin to panic, heart pounding in my ears so loud it’s deafening. Deletion. That sounds like death. But aren’t I already dead? My anxiety rises as my magic begins to become familiar to me again, like an old friend visiting after years apart. It curls at the edges of my skin, humming in my blood, sparking.

The AI voice slashes through the darkness, metallic and unfeeling:

ANOMALY CONFIRMED

DELETION IN PROGRESS